Friday, August 29, 2008

Of Inserts, art, and things that could get me in trouble.

Hey Everyone - wait...no one knows about this blog, so really I'm just saying hey to myself - that's strange, but hopefully all that will change soon and you'll all be reading this going "why the fuck is he saying hi to himself, hmmm lonely much?"

Anyway thought I would post a little teaser art for the Hills Run Red. The art your seeing is a poster design that I worked on with my good pal and hopefully future production designer Michael Broom - a scarily talented guy who was very instrumental - and just plain mental - in designing the look for the killer in the movie - Babyface.

This is an insert poster design for the movie within the movie. Now I hear what your saying, "Wait, movie within a movie?" Yes The Hills Run Red continues, though not instigated by me, the movie about a group of people making a movie - and add on to that for this one that the group in my movie, who are making a movie, is about ...wait... you got it - A MOVIE.

Everyone confused yet?

The first movie I directed some 8 years ago - The Dead Hate the Living ( and so do many others it seems hate the movie) was about a group of indie filmmakers who broke into an abandoned hospital to shoot a zombie movie - with hilarious consequences!! Um.... yeah.

The Hills Run Red is about a group of documentarians who travel to the middle of nowhere in search of answers that surround an obscure but notorious slasher movie made in the early 80's called The Hills Run Red - with hilarious consequences!!! Well not really, unless you are seriously fucked in the head, and then probably like me, you'll find the humor somewhere in it.

It wasn't my dream or goal to find another movie that dealt with some kind of movie making plot, but sometimes these things just find you, and after many years trying to make another movie there is a time when you work with what you are given and try to make it better, more interesting and apply what you've learned before.

That has been accomplished. It's miles different from The Dead Hate the Living, and I can't wait for people to see it.

Anyway back to the art. I have always been a fan of painted poster art of the early slasher movies of the 80's. From Friday the 13th to The Burning, even Grizzly had amazing painted posters and it's an art form that has sadly been almost completely dissolved with the advent of photoshop. Now I love me some photoshop and honestly that program is the only way someone like me who can't draw a straight line can satisfy their artistic cravings, but the old art said so much more about the movie than most of today's posters. If you haven't seen Frank Darabont's The Mist (and if you haven't, then why are you here?) you'll appreciate the first few minutes in regards to painted poster art, and then appreciate the monster awesomeness of the rest.

Insert posters where basically just a slice of a full movie poster. 14"x36" as opposed to 27"x41". I loved their compactness and the fact that they take up less wall space. I have a decent collection of insert posters myself. Sadly they don't make insert posters or the other old promo favorite the half sheet. It has always been my dream to have an insert poster and half sheet for a movie I did, and now THANKS TO PHOTOSHOP I can.

So here is my first attempt at The Hills Run Red (movie within the movie) insert poster. The powers that be (the studio) will probably hate it and only let me use it in the movie itself, but I think something like this would be a really cool giveaway.

Also I would like to direct anyone that reads this to my good friend Joe Lynch's (Wrong Turn 2) blog, where he in his latest blog wrote some very nice things about some footage he was show or NOT SHOWN ;) the other night. He tends to ramble, like me I guess, but his blogs are always informative, usually fucking funny, and he always tells it like it is.